The Wizard Convention

I ventured downtown last night for the first time in ages. By downtown I mean Wall Street downtown. I went to school down there and used to skate the streets a lot at night, mostly because after about 6pm there is no traffic and you can hang out in the middle of the road. Last night I was on foot, opting out of an accident involving my ten dollar 'fucky' Wal Mart skateboard.














This intersection used to offer a pretty brilliant view of the World Trade Center. It was the first time that I saw the rubble really close up, at this intersection, a day or so after September 11th. There's nothing much there now other than sky, which I guess is pretty nice, especially when you are surrounded on all sides by tall, relatively inelegant buildings.
















Suffering through the catastrophe not of September 11th, but of the September 11th memorials going on this week it really got me thinking how much has changed in this city. I watched the new wtc video on the gothamist and also saw the newly released video of the plane (maybe) flying into the pentagon. That's what I have done this week. I, like most people, am pretty offended by george bush wandering around the city laying wreathes on things or releasing doves or whatever sort of mickey mouse bullshit he's up to. I am suspicious of everything that that guy does. Hence I am suspicious of the 9/11 commission report and all of that malarky, but that's another thing all together. All I was really getting at was the fact that Wall Street now has hydraulic barricades in the middle of the street to prevent unauthorized traffic from passing.















It looks a bit too much like a Checkpoint Charlie-type scenario for me to be comfortable with it. Also, the machine gun-toting national guard in conjunction with the big flags make me a bit uneasy as well. How were we so easily convinced that fascism is a foolproof way to protect ourselves?
















Well, this has certainly taken a turn for the grim. OK, so I'm packed and ready for my trip to Alaska. All I have left to do is program a lighting show for a Clap Your Hands Say Yeah tour and finish the unending struggle that seems to surround the construction of their backdrop. Whatever, it will be a breeze. 2 more days....
















I have also been wearing this t-shirt for most of the day:















I know everyone is a bit envious of it. I know when I'm not wearing it that I am. I got it at the Boris show last night. Holy hell that was one of the best shows that I've seen in a long time. Boris, in case you failed to read the little wikipedia thing can either be a rock band, a metal band, or just plain vomit-inducing noise. Last night was a little bit of all three, and it was spectacular. Titan and Pearls and Brass opened. Titan was a little bit like a metal version of Spinal Tap's 'Jazz Odyssey.' I did admire their adventurous spirit, though. Pearls and Brass were like Sabbath and Deep Purple. I'm letting the Deep Purple slide because they just plugged straight into their amps, turned them all the way up and just shredded on some sludgy metal for about forty minutes. The show was at the knitting factory so, as well as sounding like a CB radio inside a sock inside a closet there was, miraculously, a pole obstructing the view of each and every person there.




























Boris came on like Godzilla stumbling into Tokyo (excuse the obligatory Japanese reference, but they did have a giant gong onstage..?)














There was a lot of smoke and a hell of a lot of noise, but the good kind...































The crowd went absolutely apeshit. Here's a great picture of the pole that was right in front of me. Check the headless guitar-bass combo. Hot. Also, see if you can spot their biggest fan (s).
















That's right, the big bearded guy flashing the devil horns all night. He and someone who could only have been his identical twin brother were beating the shit out of eachother from the moment the band walked onstage (they also beat the shit out of this little guy who looks a lot lot like the girl with the moustache in Le Tigre..I saw him at the Dinosaur Jr. show as well). These two guys were throwing eachother around and banging into things onstage. The microphone stand fell over a number of times and these two guys picked it right back up and proceeded pushing and shoving.














All of the chaos at the front of the stage, coupled with the blinding noise coming from the six-foot-high guitar cabinets eventually turned the entire room into what can only be described as, well a mosh pit. I haven't seen anything like this since I was about 15 years old. It was pretty funny, really. It doesn't look like much, but there were a bunch of skinny kids pushing each other all over the knitting factory. One guy even climbed onto the stage and jumped off into the crowd. I wasn't quick enough to get a picture, but the crowd did part like the red sea and dude landed, face first, on the floor.
















Oh, it really brightened up my day. I had considered not even going because I was tired and in a shit mood. I have never been so thankful to have ignored my instincts. I believe that the only way to describe it would be the only thing shouted in between songs. 'Fuck Yeah' (and occasionally 'Shit Yeah,' but mostly 'Fuck Yeah').